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Tue, 31 Mar 2015 22:00:33 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.1.1When Tom Hanks Met Carly Rae Jepsen and Broke the Internethttp://nerdist.com/when-tom-hanks-met-carly-rae-jepsen-and-broke-the-internet/
http://nerdist.com/when-tom-hanks-met-carly-rae-jepsen-and-broke-the-internet/#commentsSat, 07 Mar 2015 22:00:55 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=230518In 2012, Carly Rae Jepsen made waves with her hit “Call Me Maybe,” and broke the internet by performing it alongside Jimmy Fallon and the Roots. With her new video “I Really Like You,” she asked the question: “How can I top that success?” The answer is one word: HANKS.

The video, released yesterday, takes us through what I HAVE to believe is a normal day in the life of Tom Hanks, as he gets up in the morning and walks through the city, lip-syncing Jepsen without a care in the world. If you think you have an arguement AGAINST this, go back and listen to his appearances on The Nerdist Podcast here and here. You will never be more pleased to be proven wrong in your life. Signing autographs and taking selfies with fans along the way, he finally meets up with Jepsen and breaks into a song and dance number as only the star of BIG can do.

Here is the video in all it’s glory, and should act as a great palate-cleanser for the Nickelback video we posted yesterday. (Pay no attention to the cameo at the end. Although I will say this: If you are trying to get your act together, being seen with Tom Hanks is a GREAT start.)

You can find more on Carly Rae, such as future releases and tour dates, on her official website.

Is Tom Hanks still the greatest person ever? Is he now the worst? Let me know on Twitter or in the comments below!

]]>http://nerdist.com/when-tom-hanks-met-carly-rae-jepsen-and-broke-the-internet/feed/10BIG News: Tom Hanks is Writing a Collection of Short Stories About Typewritershttp://nerdist.com/big-news-tom-hanks-is-writing-a-collection-of-short-stories-about-typewriters/
http://nerdist.com/big-news-tom-hanks-is-writing-a-collection-of-short-stories-about-typewriters/#commentsTue, 04 Nov 2014 00:30:14 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=197827Ha, ha, ha, BIG news. Yeah, it’s BIG news indeed (OK, we’ll stop): Tom Hanks, the universally most beloved human to have ever existed in the history of time and space (I mean, probably) will be writing a collection of short stories. And those stories will all revolve around his most beloved collectible: the typewriter.

Fans of the podcast are well aware of Hanks’ love of those word machines that go all clickity-clack — Hardwick’s typewriter gift is what convinced him to come on the show, after all — but this takes that adoration to a whole ‘nother level. A literary one.

Working together with fancy-schmancy publishing house Alfred A. Knopf, Hanks will write a series of stories inspired by a series of photos of the things he has in his own personal collection. According to a statement from the publisher obtained by The New York Times, “The stories are not about the typewriters themselves, but rather the stories are something that might have been written on one of them,” explained Hanks.

This isn’t Hanks’ first time at the writing rodeo, though his first foray was very recent. In October, the New Yorker published “Alan Bean Plus Four,” an original short story from the actor that followed four friends orbiting the moon in a DIY spaceship.

“I’ve been around great storytellers all my life and, like an enthusiastic student, I want to tell some of my own,” said Hanks when asked about his newly acquired literary ambitions.

Would you read a collection of short stories inspired by photographs of his typewriters? Think Hanks-y boy should read one to us all aloud? Let us know what you think in the comments!

]]>http://nerdist.com/big-news-tom-hanks-is-writing-a-collection-of-short-stories-about-typewriters/feed/0TV-Cap: STAR WARS REBELS Renewed, Plus Clips from BROOKLYN NINE-NINE and BOB’S BURGERShttp://nerdist.com/tv-cap-star-wars-rebels-renewed-plus-clips-from-brooklyn-nine-nine-and-bobs-burgers/
http://nerdist.com/tv-cap-star-wars-rebels-renewed-plus-clips-from-brooklyn-nine-nine-and-bobs-burgers/#commentsFri, 03 Oct 2014 14:30:36 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=188518Happy Friday, TV-lovers! This one’s gonna be a shorty. Because, well, it’s nearly the weekend and who wants to bother themselves with tons and tons of words, right? Particularly when there’s Gone Girl to be seen! And, you know, other non-movie related things. Plus, we’ve got to be real: not a heck of a lot of TV news happened in the past 24 hours since our last TV-capping, so here we are.

The T Word Trailer: Bless Laverne Cox and this MTV special we’re really looking forward to, Laverne Cox Presents The T Word. It premieres simultaneously on MTV and LOGO at 7pm on October 17th. There will be a live, on-air discussion with Cox and SuChin Pak immediately after. We will be tuning in for sure. Won’t you? [Jezebel]

More Pan for NBC: It’s called “milking it,” folks. NBC has purchased a live action rom com, single camera series from Space Station 76 star Marisa Coughlan (and Rashida Jones and Will McCormack’s Le Train Train production shingle) called Wendy and Peter. The series will be loosely based on that fairy tale…plus Coughlan’s own dating life. [Deadline]

Signed, Sealed, Hanks-livered: Good lord I love me some Tom Hanks. But so does everyone. I’ve met one person in my entire life — including crowd-sourcing the Internet — who does not like the Hanx and I am still mystified, to this day, as to her reasoning. It just does not make sense, disliking Tom Hanks. He’s Tom EFFING Hanks, you guys! Charming actorman and doer of good deeds, like his team up with HBO for the Concert for VALOR. It’s in support of our veterans — folks in dire need of it, because America’s not that great to them, let’s be real. Folks like Eminem, Jamie Foxx, Dave Grohl, Metallica, John Oliver, Rihanna, Bruce Springsteen, Carrie Underwood, the Zac Brown Band, Meryl Streep, and Steven Spielberg are all schedule to at least appear, if not perform (fingers crossed Meryl takes the stage with Dave Grohl, yes/no/wtf?). HANKS YOU NATIONAL TREASURE, YOU! [The Hollywood Reporter]

Brooklyn Nine-Nine Meets The Closer: Kyra Sedgwick will be appearing on Brooklyn Nine-Nine. This is not a drill. I repeat: The Closer herself is closing in on precinct ninety-nine and she’s got some unfinished business to attend to with Captain Holt (Andre Braugher). There’s a funny clip at the link so click the thing. Do it, do it! [TVLine]

Word Hard or Die Trying: I’ve already told you all before I’m not animation’s biggest fan (I KNOW, I know) BUTTTT (heh, butts) there is something so deliciously charming and hilarious about Bob’s Burgers so I went ahead and took the plunge. Turns out? Just like you all knew way, way before me: it is very funny and good! Oh that H. Jon Benjamin — what can’t he do, right? I’m sorry I didn’t listen sooner, you guys. Please forgive me — I come baring gifts. Clips from the upcoming new season. HUZZAH AND HOORAY AND EC CETERA! We’re all going to laugh and laugh and laugh on Sunday when it returns. And it will be good.

Can you name all the ways in which Tina from Bob’s Burgers is the best? Just try to, we dare you, in the comments.

]]>http://nerdist.com/tv-cap-star-wars-rebels-renewed-plus-clips-from-brooklyn-nine-nine-and-bobs-burgers/feed/0ENLISTED Team Will Bring BIG to the Small Screenhttp://nerdist.com/enlisted-team-will-bring-big-to-the-small-screen/
http://nerdist.com/enlisted-team-will-bring-big-to-the-small-screen/#commentsWed, 01 Oct 2014 01:30:02 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=187584Last season, few shows were more well received that that of the now defunct Enlisted on Fox. Hailing from Cougar Town’s Kevin Biegel and Men of a Certain Age’s Mike Royce, the military comedy took fanbases by storm and narrowly missed out on renewal by Yahoo! following the network’s pick-up of Community season six. However, not wanting to go their separate ways, Biegel and Royce have decided to jump right back in the saddle together with an all new comedy project at Fox that has some “big” potential behind it.

According to Variety, Fox has ordered a half-hour event series from the duo based on the classic Tom Hanks film, Big. Royce and Biegel are set to co-write and executive produce the series, with no word yet on casting.

About a boy who’s magically transformed into an adult overnight, the 1988 film has maintained as a fan favorite for nearly three decades. With the new series, viewers will explore “what it means to be an adult and what it means to be a kid, and how in today’s world those two things are more confused than ever.”

While it’s sad to see Enlisted go, it’s nice to know the Mike Royce/Kevin Biegel partnership isn’t over just yet. From the antics on “Prank War” to the drama of “Pete’s Airstream,” Enlisted proved it could deliver on both comedy and heart, which is exactly what an adaption of Big needs. There’s no doubt in our minds this writing team’s going to deliver on something special come this time next year.

Are you looking forward to a series adaptation of Big? Let us know in the comments below.

]]>http://nerdist.com/enlisted-team-will-bring-big-to-the-small-screen/feed/2Tom Hanks Conquers the App Store With Old-timey Typewriter Apphttp://nerdist.com/tom-hanks-conquers-the-app-store-with-old-timey-typewriter-app/
http://nerdist.com/tom-hanks-conquers-the-app-store-with-old-timey-typewriter-app/#commentsTue, 19 Aug 2014 13:30:59 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=175694Damn you Tom Hanks and your relentless talent and charisma! First you conquer the box office, then you head over to TV and create a bunch of groundbreaking series, and now you have to dominate the App Store?

Hanks!

Seriously, this is kind of cool; Hanks’ ipad typewriting app, Hanx Writer just climbed to the top of the App Store charts in its first week of release. The free app converts your iPad into a manual typewriter, complete with a lack of DELETE key (that’s right – think it out before you type it), it’s essentially word processor with the sites and sounds of an antique typewriter. Handily, the app can pair with your Bluetooth keyboard so that you can retain all of that lovely screen real estate, and if you don’t like the look of the current virtual typewriter model included in the free app, Hanx Writer offers in-app purchases of additional skins including the Hanx 707 and the Hanx Golden Touch.

Of course, we could have told you Hanks was a fan of old-school typing devices. There was that time our own Chris Hardwick once, uh, convinced the Oscar-winning actor to appear on the Nerdist podcast with the gentle nudging of a personally-typed message on a 1934 Smith Corona portable on Nerdist letterhead. Mr. Hanks was able to overcome his shock at the attempted bribery, and joined Chris on the October podcast in advance of the release of the modern pirate drama Captain Phillips.

Interested in Hanx Writer? You can nab it for yourself in the App Store.

]]>http://nerdist.com/tom-hanks-conquers-the-app-store-with-old-timey-typewriter-app/feed/5Watch Tom Hanks Dance to ‘This is How We Do It’ Thanks to Justin Bieber (Really)http://nerdist.com/watch-tom-hanks-dance-to-this-is-how-we-do-it-thanks-to-justin-bieber-really/
http://nerdist.com/watch-tom-hanks-dance-to-this-is-how-we-do-it-thanks-to-justin-bieber-really/#commentsWed, 09 Jul 2014 00:00:45 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=165471For whatever reason, Tom Hanks was at Justin Bieber’s manager’s wedding this weekend. (His name is Scooter Braun. Maybe they’re friends or maybe Hanksyboy is just that whimsical that he’d show up to a grown man named Scooter’s nuptials. Because I mean, wouldn’t you?) And, for once in his life, the Beebz did the world a kindness and uploaded a video of America’s dad onto the Internet dancing to Montell Jordan’s “This Is How We Do It.” And it is very, very good.

In what’s sure to be a surprise to no one, Hanks has really got some moves. Would you expect anything less from the man that brought you That Thing You Do! In addition to shaking his arms and snapping his fingers like he’s really ~living~ that Fiddler on the Roof life (while wearing a yarmulke and tallit no less!), Hanks sings along with the seminal Jordan hit and reminds us all that we may all age but we never lose our flavor. Not if we don’t want to, at least. Tom Hanks can literally do no wrong (outside of not adopting us).

And considering this is a rare moment of goodness from the young lad of swag they call Justin Bieber, we feel it necessary to thank him for this gift — arguably the best thing he’s ever done. Maybe ever in his life, but certainly in the last several years.

Watch everyone’s favorite human in video below.

What do you think of Hanksy’s moves? What song should he perform next, you think? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.

]]>http://nerdist.com/watch-tom-hanks-dance-to-this-is-how-we-do-it-thanks-to-justin-bieber-really/feed/3Mansion From THE MONEY PIT Listed For $12.5 Millionhttp://nerdist.com/mansion-from-the-money-pit-listed-for-12-5-million/
http://nerdist.com/mansion-from-the-money-pit-listed-for-12-5-million/#commentsWed, 18 Jun 2014 19:30:55 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=159063If you were to describe the hellion of a mansion that is the centerpiece of 1986’s The Money Pit as a “fixer-upper”, you’re being way too nice. As the title suggests, Tom Hanks and Shelley Long try to fix up their brand new home, which is really an old home with all those deceptive real estate buzz words like “charm,” “a rustic feel,” etc. Almost 30 years later, you now have a chance to own that very home that The Money Pit was shot in. All you need is a cool $12.5 million lying around somewhere. Even if you adjusted for inflation, this place isn’t so much a “money pit” as it is a “summer home for the 1%”.

The house is located specifically in Lattingtown, New York and was built in 1898, sitting on 5.4 acres. As you can probably guess, the house is completely intact and fully functional after a complete remodel. “The anti-Money Pit“, as listing broker Shawn Elliot describes it, boasts 8 bedrooms, 7 full bathrooms underneath three stories. Also, don’t forget about a six-car garage, a pool house bigger than many apartments, a saltwater pool, and a driveway that’s as long as an Olympic running track.

It’s surprising to think that The Money Pit, executive produced by Steven Spielberg, used a lavish house to stage all of their home renovation chaos instead of building one on a studio backlot. The same can be pondered for the glass mansion in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off that just sold for $1.06 million. Either way, movies homes, no matter how much they were depicted being destroyed cost more than a pretty penny.

What movie home would you want to go on sale and possibly be out of your price range? Let us know in the comments below.

While performing “Chopsticks” using your feet and alongside a partner may be no easy task, this morning Jezebel posted a video of two employees who have definitely upped the ante.

Watch as the girls play “Toccata and Fugue in D Minor” on the iconic toy store Big Piano. Very impressive!

]]>http://nerdist.com/from-chopsticks-to-toccata-and-fugue-in-d-minor-on-the-fao-schwarz-big-piano/feed/2Oscar Review: CAPTAIN PHILLIPShttp://nerdist.com/oscar-review-captain-phillips/
http://nerdist.com/oscar-review-captain-phillips/#commentsMon, 27 Jan 2014 21:00:07 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=108409Paul Greengrass doesn’t make movies like other directors. His films – whether mainstream action capers like his Bourne movies or political-baiting ground-level actioners like United 93 or Bloody Sunday – are all possessed of an immediate, handheld style that critics often refer to as “steely.” It’s tempting to refer to his style as having no style whatsoever. He’s just going to charge in headfirst, documenting rather than commenting. In a way, this has allowed Greengrass to tackle touchy political or topical material without succumbing to partisanship.

The touchy topic he covers in Captain Phillips is the true story of Richard Phillips, an American ship captain who was abducted by Somalian pirates. His ship was the first American ship to be taken by pirates in centuries. Greengrass’ approach was purely procedural. We get to see Phillips (Tom Hanks) as the no-nonsense leader, sticking to the book, and trying to use his wits to outrun, evade, and eventually just survive in the face of actual piracy. We also spend time with the Somalian Muse (Barkhed Abdi), the skeletal criminal in charge of the situation, and the process he goes through. We even get to see his situation at home, and why piracy is perhaps one of the only viable career options for him.

Captain Phillips is a cold movie. This is about a battle of wits and a clash of personalities (Phillips and Muse have several conversations about piracy), but the personalities are perhaps not bigger than the situation. Like most action films, we only see the hero in a position of steely determination, reacting to extreme situations. Unlike most action films, this is a straightforwardly realistic and unapologetically metallic telling. This turns what could have been a bold and risky melodramatic adventure film into the rough crime that it actually is.

One of the talents of a good biographer is to wring tension out of a situation of which we already know the outcome. Richard Phillips survived to write a book about his experiences, but, in the midst of the film, you do feel the dreadful danger he was in, and begin to suspect that he may not make it out alive. Films like Argo and Apollo 13 also had this power, albeit in a more comestible package.

The one shining moment of the film – and the reason Tom Hanks should have been nominated for an Academy Award for – was when the situation is resolved, and Phillips is allowed to finally let go of the tension he had been carrying for the bulk of the film. We see that he is not a steely man, but just a fellow who was able to keep it together in an extreme situation. When he finally breaks down into tears and panic, it’s one of the most heartrending movie moments of 2013.

Is a procedural approach to controversial material a cheat? Greengrass presents us controversial events with so little comment, that we begin to wonder where he stands. He begins to resemble a journalist more than a filmmaker. I would say that – now that we’ve seen his career at large – Greengrass is looking for the middle path in extreme situations. The immediate drama of a situation has no political affiliation. It just has the panic of the moment. And there is an integrity to that.

Paul Greengrass was not nominated for an Academy Award for directing, which, I think, means Captain Phillips has no chance to win Best Picture. This is not to say it’s bad. It’s really rather good. But this is clearly the consolation prize movie this year. Tom Hanks wasn’t even up for Best Actor. I wouldn’t put it on my own top-ten list. But it feels like the kind of film that should be up for an Oscar, y’know?

What the movie has going for it is its immediate dramatic oomph. The tension and the panic are very real. And it ultimately becomes a film about human desperation, in panic situations and vocationally.

Odds to win: 50:1

]]>http://nerdist.com/oscar-review-captain-phillips/feed/2Review: SAVING MR. BANKShttp://nerdist.com/review-saving-mr-banks/
http://nerdist.com/review-saving-mr-banks/#commentsFri, 27 Dec 2013 18:00:58 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=103442The short review: Although it is about 30 minutes too long and a bit by the numbers, Saving Mr. Banks offers some splendid performances, has undeniable charm, and is one of the best cinematic presents to unwrap this holiday season.

The long review: While much to do has been made over how Saving Mr. Banks presents a gussied up, less-than-accurate version of P.L. Travers and her relationship with Walt Disney, this review won’t be focusing on that. For a well-written, studied takedown of the film, I wholeheartedly recommend reading Amy Nicholson’s review at L.A. Weekly. In the meantime, I’m going to review the film on its own merits based on my knowledge, emotional response, and state of mind when I first saw it.

Do you smell that? Those aren’t chestnuts roasting on an open fire. That’s the smell of fresh Oscar bait, cooling on the window sill, waiting for eager audiences and Academy voters to catch its scent and follow it like a siren song off the gangplank and into the ever-deepening ocean of the cult of Disney. Everything about Saving Mr. Banks‘ marketing smacks of making a push to garner awards season nominations for its two leads, Tom Hanks as Walt Disney and Emma Thompson as the indefatigable P.L. Travers. That isn’t a slight against the film; just its inexorable marketing campaign. It’s actually quite deserving of the buzz it has received thus far. In fact, it’s quite good.

Director John Lee Hancock’s Saving Mr. Banks is an exceedingly likable, devilishly charming little film that gives us an insider view of the tumultuous process Walt Disney went through in order to fulfill a promise he’d made to his daughters some twenty years prior to turn Mary Poppins into a feature film. But for all Hanks’ charisma and magnetic screen presence, the story isn’t about Walt Disney; it is about P.L. Travers, the brains behind Poppins, and her intense, deeply complex personal relationship with the character that she just couldn’t seem to let go.

Much like how you know going into Titanic that the boat sinks at the end, you know that Walt gets his way and Mary Poppins becomes a feature film in 1964. If this came as a spoiler to you, please log off right now and consider what you’ve done with your life that lead you to this point without that knowledge. The challenge, as I’ve mentioned with films like Captain Phillips, is in making the journey an exciting one, one that we as viewers will want to embark upon for two-plus hours when we already know the conclusion is foregone. Screenwriter Kelly Marcel, who was brought in to work on a preexisting script from Sue Smith, keeps the action moving by splitting our focus between the past and present, P.L. Travers’ fateful two-week trip to Burbank, CA where Walt tried everything in his power to woo her and Travers’ youth spent in the magical realist paradise that is the Australian countryside and the father she idealized (Colin Farrell).

In a film that runs as excessively long as Saving Mr. Banks (we get it — they make Mary Poppins into a movie), any change of scenery is a welcome change of pace. For my money, the film’s length is its greatest sin, although it teeters on the edge of getting overly sentimental much like this cockatoo on the precipice of a chocolate fondue fountain. Silly similies aside, the film’s tone – a constant, gradual emotional crescendo – wears on the viewer. In a column in the Los Angeles Times, Marcel said, “With Banks, there was always a fear that the film would be overly sentimental, but John pulled us back from the edge every time.” If he pulled them back from the edge, then I hesitate to gaze into the abyss at the mushy pile of emotional overindulgence lying at the cliff’s bottom. The film earns many of its emotional peaks and valleys, but at times, particularly toward the end, it had my rolling my eyes and mouthing, “get on with it”.

I would be remiss in my duties if I did not call special attention to Emma Thompson and her dynamite portrayal of Travers. Historical accuracy aside, Thompson manages to make this staid, priggish prickly pear of a character into a three-dimensional, emotionally grounded, sympathetic figure. Say what you will about the film’s myriad flashbacks – its best sequences lie in Thompson trying to make her peace with the past in the modern day, and in particular, her rapturously grumpy encounters with the easy-breezy “California Livin'” lifestyle embodied by Walt Disney and his crew in the sunny, comparative paradise of Los Angeles.

Hanks, too, is worthy of praise, but the film’s supporting players – Paul Giamatti’s relentlessly peppy chauffeur, B.J. Novak and Jason Schwartzman’s Sherman Brothers, Bradley Whitford’s hapless Don DaGradi, to name a few – are what elevates Saving Mr. Banks from good to great and makes it a must see this holiday season, especially for fans of Disney and those curious about what a slice of development hell looks like.

If you can can swallow the sugarcoated version of history and take it at face value, Saving Mr. Banks is a wonderful addition to Disney’s live action oeuvre. Go ahead and put on those rose-colored glasses and let Hancock’s vision of the Disney of yesteryear and the long, winding road to take Mary Poppins from children’s book to cinematic classic lift you up and away. It may be lengthy, but Saving Mr. Banks is most assuredly a journey worth embarking upon, thanks in no small part to Emma Thompson’s studied, lived-in performance and a stellar supporting cast to raise her up over their heads and on to the east wind.

Did you see the film? Let us know what you thought in the quemments below.

]]>http://nerdist.com/review-saving-mr-banks/feed/17This is Your Captain Speaking: CAPTAIN PHILLIPS’ Barkhad Abdihttp://nerdist.com/this-is-your-captain-speaking-captain-phillips-barkhad-abdi/
http://nerdist.com/this-is-your-captain-speaking-captain-phillips-barkhad-abdi/#commentsFri, 11 Oct 2013 23:00:21 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=93032While Tom Hanks is generally regarded as one of the nicest, hardest working guys in the game, relatively little is known about his Captain Phillips co-star Barkhad Abdi. Born in war-torn Somalia, Abdi grew up amongst the violence and conflict that has come to characterize the city of Mogadishu. When conditions grew to be too much, his parents, with the aid of a family friend, escaped to Yemen by way of Ethiopia. Seven years later, Abdi and his family won a lottery that allowed them to come to the United States, settling down in Minnesota along with a sizable population of other Somali refugees. Now 28 years old, Abdi is starring in Captain Phillips as Muse, the Somali pirate captain who takes the titular captain hostage.

Offering up a nuanced, deeply affecting portrayal of a man driven to piracy by overwhelming circumstance and forced to play to the end of a zero-sum game, Abdi is an electrifying presence on the silver screen. From the chaos and violence of Mogadishu to an open casting call in snowy Minnesota to being the toast of Tinseltown, Abdi’s voyage has been anything but typical. At a recent press day in Los Angeles, I sat down with the insightful, relaxed young actor to talk to him about Captain Phillips, making his acting debut, and why this was an important story to tell.

NERDIST: How’s your day gone so far, man?

BARKHAD ABDI: I’m doing great.

N: Getting tired of answering the same questions all day?

BA: It’s all right. You get used to it.

N: I’ve got to say — I was blown away by your performance. You were so good.

BA: Thank you.

N: I was shocked to learn that this was your first movie. That’s really impressive — going toe to toe with someone like Tom Hanks.

BA: Yeah.

N: Tell me a little bit about your background. Tell me how you got involved with this project, and what it was like making your acting debut on such a grand scale.

BA: You know, it was just something that happened. It was another day, hanging out at my friend’s house, and just watching — I don’t usually watch TV — and it came on TV. Tom Hanks — local Somali casting. So, I was like, I like Tom Hanks — let’s check it out. I went there and it was a whole crowd of people — more than 700 people there.

N: 700? Wow!

BA: The first day, they asked me, “What’s your name? Where were you born? How old are you?” I gave them three answers, and I come out of the room, and they gave me a paper and said, “That’s movie lines. Go and study that and come back tomorrow. Just memorize those lines. Come back tomorrow because you have to do it.” I go, “OK.” I go, and I look at it. It was not hard, it’s just the same scene on the bridge. So it’s just some questions. I tried to put some accent into it.

I go, and the next time I come back, less people. But this time, you have to be in groups. To audition, you have to be in groups of four people. You can look around and see the rest, the other people, and make your own group. But luckily, there standing with me were those friends of mine who each had different characters, so we made our own group. We were called group number one. And we auditioned — we acted it out. It wasn’t that good the first day. But we went home, and we practiced the part. We came back the next day, and it was better. We had mistakes, but we hadn’t noticed all the mistakes, but we worked on the ones that we could feel were mistakes. We turned to each other, and we go back and we practice again, until we were like, “We got it!”

We had silence for two weeks. No one telling us nothing. So I know I’m not going to get it. It was like, “Tsk. I’m not going to get this thing anyway, so who cares?” I’ll just go live my life. [laughter]

N: So that must have been a good phone call to get a couple of weeks later!

BA: A couple of weeks later, I get a phone call from [casting director] Francine [Maisler]. She’s, like, “Hey, the director wants to meet you guys.” And I was like, “Really? OK.” We flew out to L.A., and he told us—he took us to this restaurant, that’s where we meet Paul Greengrass. I was a big fan of his work. I love the Bournes and United 93, it’s just one of my top movies, you know? I loved them. So I knew him, I knew his profile, so he took us, and he told us that we had the part. I was so excited, man! We jumped right in the ocean!

N: That’s awesome!

BA: Even though we didn’t know how to swim, we just got ourselves wet.

N: That was something else that I couldn’t believe when I was reading the notes, was that you guys had to learn how to swim, and then learn how to pilot these boats like you had been doing it your whole life. Tell me a little bit about that, man! That would terrify me — you have to pull right up next to the giant commercial liner when all of the water is pouring down the ladder.

BA: Yeah. But you know, we went through a lot of training. We had training for about a month and a half. So we had a lot of training. We went through swimming training — we’d wake up in the morning and go to swimming training, come out and do what is called fighting, and climbing, and weapon training. And then after that we would go and do skips — I had to learn how to stay still. The good thing about it is, I was excited about it.

N: That is good.

BA: I wanted it, and these were my friends. There were some other guys, the other ship would be with us, from UK — also Somalians that lived in London, some in Manchester, and we became friends automatically. So it was all fun, and we would have laughs, and we all wanted to do it, and it was fun. It was like, “Oh, yeah, yeah!” And we would just all day laugh and enjoy ourselves. It was really good, because I got comfortable. It got comfortable to the point that I just had to play the character. I didn’t have to worry or be scared the way I was the first few days.

N: Yeah, I can imagine it being a little more daunting if you immediately just have to stand up and give your lines right off the bat.

BA: That would have been hard.

N: So it’s interesting that you mention that the guys in the other boat were guys from the UK. I knew that there is a pretty sizable Somali-American population in Minnesota. Somali piracy is definitely a hot button issue today. Coming from a Somalian background, why do you feel this is an important story to tell, and how do you want to approach that?

BA: You know, I think this is a true story, a really good story, because Somalia in the media has been a problem, and sad story after sad story after another one. I grew up watching these sad stories. I was at the war. It went from a peaceful place to a disaster, and it still is a disaster. But at the same time, it gives a different look at the Somali people. They all are not criminals. There’s a lot of good stories. Somali people are survivors! They go through a lot just to get out, but they all don’t. Even the ones that are outside, they help the ones that are in the country. They send money, and they start business in Somalia, and they do all this sort of stuff to get opportunities for the others, relatives or friends or family.

I think that’s really great, but the media never shows that side. The media always focuses on the bad side. When you do that to people, I think you destroy them from the inside. They get to the point where they hate themselves. I’m really proud of my people, because with all that, they still love each other, and they still, wherever they are, they help each other, and they want to become better people, and they never give up on their country.

So I truly respect them, because we have bad people. There are sad stories that come back to back, this Al-Shabaab and this bullshit going on, it’s really a disaster. They need to be eliminated, because these people that you see, teenagers that grow up around my age, they had no opportunity. We know why, which is really important. There are gangsters all over the world.

N: Yeah.

BA: Someday — you know why they’re gangsters, and someday, you don’t know why. They could have had other options. So that’s why this film at least tells you why.

N: I think you had a really good point about when you keep seeing negative portrayals of someone from your background — whatever your background is, if you see a negative portrayal of that time and time again in the media, it just wears you down. One of the things I really enjoyed about your performance, in particular, is that you really brought some nuance to the character, so you realize — it could have so easily been that you guys were the villains, but no — you guys were people, fully three dimensional people, who had motivations for doing what they did.

BA: Yep.

N: Maybe not the best course of action.

BA: Not the best course, no.

N: Well, on a lighter note, going back to training, and being that this is your first movie production, what was your favorite on-set, your favorite “Holy shit, I can’t believe this is happening!” kind of moment? Like, “This is so cool!”

BA: Oh… you know, right after I met Tom, I remember telling him, “I can’t believe I’m doing a scene with the Forrest Gump guy!”

N: [laughter]

BA: It was — the whole experience, you know, just looking at the Navy ships — it was amazing! And meeting the Navy, and people around my age that are working there, just good people. They welcomed us there, and come and talk to me. They wouldn’t treat me like an outsider — just a pirate. They would come to me, they would talk to me, and ask me if I need anything. So it was just a whole, great experience.

N: Awesome.

BA: Yeah, it was awesome.

N: I’m not sure if you guys have had any advance screenings or anything like that — I know the film is not technically coming out until next week [at the time of this interview], but has there been any response so far from the Somali or the Somali-American community?

BA: There’s always — you know, the negative response is always there. Haters will always be haters. But you know there’s people all over the world, from Seattle, from Ohio, London, Sweden, on my Facebook, complimenting me, saying “We’re proud of you. You’re great. Keep doing it. You’ve put our people on the map.” All these good things, you know. I’m glad. I’m glad. And just like you said, it could have been the other way, but it was all good people that came together and managed to show the reality of the situation.

N: Yeah, I think you guys really knocked it out of the park. I also read that you were currently directing a film of your own. What can you tell me about that?

BA: Yeah, I left it alone now.

N: Are you going to go back to it?

BA: No, it’s just one of those things that I want to put on the side, because it was just something that wouldn’t work. It was like, every time I crossed one bridge, another would come.

BA: Yeah, and it took a lot of my time, and I just want to put it on the side now. I just want to focus on acting for now and see how good it goes, and maybe later I’ll start directing.

N: Cool! Thanks a lot man, I really appreciate it! It was a pleasure talking to you and you did a fantastic job.

BA: Thank you.

—

Captain Phillips is in theaters now. You can keep up with Barkhad on Twitter. Let us know what you thought of him in the film in the comments below!

]]>http://nerdist.com/this-is-your-captain-speaking-captain-phillips-barkhad-abdi/feed/4Review: CAPTAIN PHILLIPS Sets an Open Course for Actionhttp://nerdist.com/review-captain-phillips-sets-an-open-course-for-action/
http://nerdist.com/review-captain-phillips-sets-an-open-course-for-action/#commentsFri, 11 Oct 2013 13:00:04 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=92955The short review: Stunningly shot and laden with Oscar-caliber performances from the likes of Tom Hanks and Barkhad Abdi, Paul Greengrass’ Captain Phillips is a harrowing, tense adaptation of true events that will leave you breathless.

The long review: The problem with stories based on true events is, in many cases, that we already know how it’s going to end. Spoiler alert: Captain Phillips survives being kidnapped by pirates off of the Somali coast. Unless he had incredible foresight and a vivid imagination, there would be no other way for him to write the memoir on which =Paul Greengrass’ film is based. The challenge from a filmmaking perspective then becomes, how do you present the story and how do you keep the audience invested and engaged when the conclusion is all but foregone. With an eloquent script from The Hunger Games co-writer Billy Ray and powerful, deeply human performances from Tom Hanks and newcomer Barkhad Abdi as an anchor, Greengrass gives us a Hollywood biopic done right, a multi-faceted examination of a tense, terrifying situation and also the grim realities facing a nation like Somalia.

Based on the 2009 hijacking of the U.S. commercial container ship Maersk Alabama by a small crew of Somali pirates and the subsequent kidnapping of Captain Richard Phillips, the film wisely focuses on the relationship between Captain Phillips (Tom Hanks) and Muse, the Somali pirate captain (Barkhad Abdi) and Phillips’ jailer, during the taking of the Alabama and the subsequent standoff 145 miles off the Somali coast. Dealing with forces beyond their control, Greengrass explores the nuances of the realities of piracy in the region, setting the grim realities of globalization against a gripping backdrop of action and adventure. It would be easy to paint them as almost comic villains, but Greengrass depicts them as men who are forced into a life of criminal activity by brutal warlords, oppressive regimes, and crippling poverty. This is not a malicious act; rather, as Muse tells Phillip when he first boards the vessel through a mouthful of khat, “It’s just business.”

Phillips’ relationship with the pirates and the tense game of cat-and-mouse on the Maersk are deeply affecting, and the Captain’s eventual rescue is almost bittersweet. Like in the raid on Bin Laden’s compound in Zero Dark Thirty, it is stomach-turning and compelling at the same time, forcing the viewer to celebrate and ruminate all at once. However, the payoff is there: an unscripted scene in which Phillips, having finally been rescued, is taken to the medical bay of the American ship and he is in utter shock as the ship’s medical staff tries to debrief and examine him. Raw, visceral and profoundly primal, Hanks is at his most transformative in those final moments as a man who, under incredible duress, managed to keep his cool and at long last can finally begin to process the terrible reality of the ordeal through which has just gone.

While generally excellent, the film’s major fault is that it runs about 30 minutes too long, and given Greengrass’ apparent aversion to using a tripod, it may behoove you to pop a pre-screening dramamine so you don’t get seasick. The film’s first hour is more effectively paced than its conclusion, but the thrilling nature and the jaw-dropping action sequences that occur during the standoff between the Somali pirates and the US Navy is almost enough to forgive Greengrass his cinematic sins. To say this is a seminal film may be too soon, but I feel no such hesitation in telling you that this is easily one of the best films I have seen this year, a traumatic experience given the appropriate amount of gravitas and brought to life through some truly towering performances. Oscars, ahoy.

—

Captain Phillips is in theaters everywhere today. Stay tuned for my interview with star Barkhad Abdi later today, then let us know what you think in the comments below or reach out directly on Twitter.

]]>http://nerdist.com/review-captain-phillips-sets-an-open-course-for-action/feed/7Nerdist Podcast: Tom Hanks Returnshttp://nerdist.com/nerdist-podcast-tom-hanks-returns/
http://nerdist.com/nerdist-podcast-tom-hanks-returns/#commentsMon, 07 Oct 2013 14:00:34 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=92096Tom Hanks loves the podcast so much, he came back for more! Chris and Jonah sit down with Tom for a second time to discuss awful interview questions, his first time on The Tonight Show, and his upcoming movie, Captain Phillips!

Oh, friends, prepare yourselves to be delighted. The first trailer for the film version of the true story of when Walt Disney tried to convince Mrs. P.L. Travers to let him adapt Mary Poppins has arrived like a nanny in the wind. In Saving Mr. Banks, Disney (Tom Hanks) and Travers (Emma Thompson) could not be more dissimilar, but they are forced to eventually see eye to eye on the project, which of course went on to be one of Walt Disney Pictures’ biggest hits, being nominated for 13 Oscars and winning 5.

A good portion of it was actually filmed IN Disneyland, and that, in itself, makes it worth seeing, but I’m particularly pleased with Jason Schwartzman and B.J. Novak as the Sherman Brothers, who won two Oscars for the movie. Saving Mr. Banks has a plum December 13th release date, and I, for one, am very excited to see it.

What do you think? Are you enchanted by seeing Disney days of yore? Tell us in the comments below!

]]>http://nerdist.com/tom-hanks-is-walt-disney-in-the-new-saving-mr-banks-trailer/feed/19Review: Cloud Atlas Does Not Shrughttp://nerdist.com/lyt-review-cloud-atlas-does-not-shrug/
http://nerdist.com/lyt-review-cloud-atlas-does-not-shrug/#commentsFri, 26 Oct 2012 13:00:30 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=58118It will be easy, and lazy, to dismiss the Wachowski siblings’ and Tom Tykwer’s Cloud Atlas (they directed alternating segments) with some silly wisecracks about how the makeup looks bad in some scenes, or the fact the interlocking narratives each bear some resemblance to existing movies (“It’s like Waterworld meets Silkwood meets One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest meets Amadeus meets Amistad meets The Matrix” – some guy who hates the Wachowskis). And there are fair criticisms to be had, certainly, but getting into them requires a little establishment first. To be honest, I can’t say I’m certain I know what I feel about the film as a whole, except that I was never bored, constantly eager to discover what would happen next and certain when the lights came up that I had seen quite the ambitious achievement. Is that the same as saying it’s a great film? Can’t say for sure that it is. But it’s certainly one I respect, even as I might have hoped for something yet more profound.

Then again, Cloud Atlas is also a movie that announces its grand intentions early on, with large-scale location shots and time-jumping that encompasses six different periods – the Pacific Ocean in the 1850s, Belgium in the ’30s, California in the ’70s, England in the present day, Korea in the next century, and what may be Hawaii in a post-apocalypse time. Most of the same actors reappear in each period, among them Tom Hanks, Halle Berry, Jim Broadbent, Ben Whishaw, Jim Sturgess, James D’arcy, Doona Bae (of Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance and The Host), Keith David, and Susan Sarandon. They don’t always play the same race, or even gender – it may seem facile to connect this to co-director Lana Wachowski’s sex change, except that at the screening I attended – with the directors in attendance – when the gender-blind casting was mentioned, she very blatantly did a comedic mock double-take, so I do assume the notion of soul not being tied to sex was a key factor.

And the same actors are not necessarily playing reincarnations of each other: Hanks as Hanks throughout, etc. The main protagonist of each tale, rather, is implied to be the same soul via a shooting star-shaped birthmark, meaning that, for example, 1850s Sturgess IS 1930s Whishaw, ’70s Berry, 2012 Broadbent, future Bae, and far-future Hanks. Souls here are not bound to similar looking bodies as they reincarnate (a possible exception being Hugo Weaving, who’s a lackey of evil every time he appears), but are doomed to eternally be surrounded by the same basic types and occasionally become them. It’s simpler than it sounds, because the whole reincarnation thing really doesn’t get much deeper than “Hey, check it out: reincarnation!” The book’s implication that each narrative is only a fiction being consumed as entertainment in each subsequent time is more subtle here, and confusing at times; rather than make us wonder who dreams who, a la the Red King in Alice Through the Looking Glass, we just wonder why something that obviously happened is being treated at times as if it did not. The link that initially makes it clear all this did happen is the recurrence of Sixsmith (D’arcy), who links the ’30s tale to the ’70s follow-up; the post-apocalypse era later establishes beyond a doubt that “future-Korea” was equally real.

Each period is also, for the most part, a separate genre, beginning with the social-justice historical drama of Sturgess’ Adam Ewing realizing the injustices of slavery. ’30s Belgium is a love story, both romantic and chaste, as secretly bisexual musician Frobisher (Wishaw) runs away to escape implicating lover Sixsmith and becomes apprentice/collaborator to great composer Vyvyan Ayrs (Broadbent), whose wife he secretly bangs on the side. Fittingly in cinematic terms, the ’70s period is a thriller, with Sixsmith now an aged nuclear scientist leaking secret materials to plucky reporter Luisa Rey (Berry). Present-day is a comedy, not just because of Hanks’ ridiculous attempt at a Cockney accent, but mostly because of Broadbent’s hilarious bluster as he finds himself unwittingly committed to a nursing home and tries to break out. Future Korea feels like very familiar Wachowski territory, as it is sci-fi action (yes, they know kung-fu) involving depersonalization and the use of human bodies as an energy source. Finally, we get the sci-fi of ideas, a kind of would-be Rod Serling tone for post-nuke humanity. In a sense, then, Cloud Atlas isn’t just commenting on life, but perhaps even more so on cinema itself as a whole, much as Holy Motors did by having its central player embody multiple roles in different genres of real life.

The makeup is utterly, brilliantly amazing in some scenes – I had no idea that was Halle Berry as a blonde German Jew – and distracting in others (are the Caucasian actors in future Korea supposed to look Asian, or like some future weird mutation of humankind in general?), occasionally comedic where applicable (Weaving as a woman is way uglier here than in Priscilla, Queen of the Desert). Hugh Grant looks super-scary as a cannibalistic Orc of the End Times, while Doona Bae simply cannot and does not look like a white Southern belle. I don’t know quite why Weaving shows up as a green-faced Alice Cooper-like devil hallucinated by post-apocalypse Hanks, but suspect that in keeping with the “totality of cinema” theme, it may be a tribute to Georges Melies’ disappearing Imp. I’m similarly not in a frame of mind to sum up all the key scenes of characters falling from great heights and explaining how they’re all alike or different – that would take multiple viewings, so suffice it to say it’s a noticeable motif, and probably something something something Paradise Lost.

Per Wikipedia, a cloud atlas is “a pictorial key to the nomenclature of clouds.” Put simply, that just means pictures of different clouds with names put to them. But when it comes down to it, they’re all just water vapor, no matter what form that may take at a given moment depending on outside factors. There are a number of different ways you could apply that metaphor to the movie; the most obvious in my mind being that storytelling – specifically of the cinematic kind – is the vapor, never created or destroyed as the laws of conservation of matter state, but merely converted (or reincarnated) from one form to another. If the various shapes herein don’t meet your preferred standard – maybe you’re more into sunny days – just keep watching the skies. Because while particles may last forever, no particular organization of them does. And that’s most definitely an underlying theme.

]]>http://nerdist.com/lyt-review-cloud-atlas-does-not-shrug/feed/7Nerdist Podcast: Tom Hankshttp://nerdist.com/nerdist-podcast-tom-hanks/
http://nerdist.com/nerdist-podcast-tom-hanks/#commentsMon, 08 Oct 2012 17:00:22 +0000http://www.nerdist.com/?p=56519Tom Hanks! Tom. Motherf–king. Hanks. What more of a description do you NEED than that? Is the fact that we talk about Tom’s career, NASA logos, Storage Wars, vintage typewriters, and blasting caps going to influence your decision any further to enjoy this very special and hilariotastic episode?? Well I guess it should, because Tom made those all really fun things to talk about. And those rumors about his being the nicest most down-to-Earth fellow? ENTIRELY TRUE.